(Newark, NJ) -- The EndPartisanship.org coalition today filed suit in the U.S. District Court in Newark, New Jersey demanding that every voter should have an equal and meaningful vote at every stage of the state-funded election process, regardless of their party affiliation or non-affiliation.

Over 47% of New Jersey voters choose not to register with a political party and 42% of American voters now self-identify as Independent or unaffiliated voters, yet most states have primary systems that give political parties special access to the voting franchise and penalize voters who do not wish to join a political party.

The Republican and Democratic Party have prevented attempts to allow nonpartisan voter participation in many states by asserting their First Amendment right of association. This is despite the fact that primary elections like those in New Jersey are conducted at significant public expense.

Fewer than 8% of all registered voters participated in New Jersey’s last primary election at a cost of $12 million to the taxpayers. This amounted to more than $92 per vote cast. And 2.6 million New Jersey voters were not allowed to vote in the primary election unless they joined either the Republican or Democratic Party.

Samuel Gregory, local counsel for the EndPartisanship.org coalition said, “Today, representatives are accountable to a small partisan base of voters. Those who choose not to participate in divisive partisan politics are pushed out or left out of meaningful participation in the electoral process. We believe the system’s first obligation should be to individual voters, not to political parties. When every voter matters, leaders are rewarded for being good representatives, not good party leaders.”

“A primary election is often the most important part of the electoral process ... By denying over 2.6 million New Jersey voters the right to cast a vote in the primary election, the State has disenfranchised nearly half of its electorate, and thereby, given private political parties and partisan voters a greater and unequal access to the voting franchise. As a result, New Jersey’s elections are not free, not equal, and not constitutional for the reasons demonstrated herein.” – Paragraph 4 of the Complaint

New Jersey plaintiffs represented in the suit by the EndPartisanship.org coalition include Mark Balsam, Charles Donahue, Hans Henkes, and Rebecca Feldman who are registered as unaffiliated voters, plaintiff Jaime Martinez, a registered Democrat, and plaintiff Tia Williams, a registered Republican.

The EndPartisanship.org coalition was co-founded by the Independent Voter Project and IndependentVoting.org, both national 501(c)(4) nonprofit organizations. The coalition includes a diverse group of independent organizations, media outlets, election reform advocates, and other participants from across the political spectrum and from across the country. The complete current list of coalition members can be found on the EndPartisanship.org coalition’s website.

The EndPartisanship.org coalition is the first organized effort to defend and promote the principle that every voter is entitled to an equal right of meaningful participation in the election process, whether or not they choose to affiliate with a political party.

Harry Kresky, counsel to Independent Voting, is the national legal advisor. S. Chad Peace, legal advisor to IVP, is the national legal strategist. Samuel Gregory is lead counsel to the New Jersey efforts with Kresky and Peace as co-counsel.

The EndPartisanship.org coalition will continue to focus on legal and political strategies designed to challenge laws, customs and practices that place the rights of political organizations above the rights of individual voters. The coalition believes that while the two major parties should continue to be an important and constructive part of our election process, a party’s strength should not be derived from institutionalized rules, laws, and court precedents. Instead, its strength should be measured by its ability to represent the concerns, hopes, and aspirations of the most voters.

EndPartisanship.org coalition members believe in three core principles:

Learn more about the EndPartisanship.org coalition and its national plans on their website, EndPartisanship.org.

About the Author

Shawn M. Griffiths

Shawn is the Election Reform Editor for IVN.us. He studied history and philosophy at the University of North Texas, and joined the IVN team in 2012. He has several years of experience covering the broad scope of political and election reform efforts across the country, and has an extensive knowledge of the movement at large. A native Texan, he now lives in San Diego, California.